Blake Griffin lined up on the block with Randy Foye at the line. The Clippers had all but sealed the win, even though the Clips almost completely lost a 29 point lead. Randy Foye missed his second free throw, Blake grabbed the rebound, missed, got his second rebound of the possession for his 10th rebound and his second triple double of the season, a monstrous 31 points (on 13 for 21 shooting), 10 rebounds and 10 assists.

“Well, you can’t say we don’t make it interesting,” Vinny said. “That’s a microcosm of our season.”

Blake’s last second triple double didn’t even count for all the excitement in Clipperland. After amassing a 29 point half time lead over a “tanking” Memphis team, in which Bledsoe had 13 points in addition to Blake’s evisceration of the Grizzlies, the Clippers gave up all but four points before settling back in for the win.

The reality is that there shouldn’t have been too much excitement to write about. The Clippers played a Grizzlies team that sat Zach Randolph, Mike Conley and Tony Allen. Or as we all know them, the Grizzlies that give the Clippers the most trouble. There is the argument that the Grizzlies wanted to face the Spurs instead of the Lakers, so they purposefully tanked the game. Without those three starters, the Clippers’ first half lead should have allowed Blake Griffin to sit. Instead, Blake Griffin played 41 minutes and eked out his second triple double of the season.

Everything that the Clippers were doing well (strong bench play, assists) failed them in the second half. The Grizzlies, maybe having seen that the Lakers were losing their lead rapidly, stormed back at the hands of the illustrious crew of Sam Young, Ish Smith, Hamad Haddadi, Greivis Vasquez and Shane Battier in the third. The Grizz charged back on a 11-0 run before a different unit ran out on a 19-4 run in the fourth. When the Clippers were charging in the first half with their second unit, in the second half that same unit coughed up passes and points so quickly that the Clippers didn’t halt the Grizzlies comeback so much as the clock did. Had there been a few more minutes in the game, the Grizzlies would have definitely comeback.

So the Clips get away, they end the season on a win, even if the game was frustrating. They finish with 32 wins on the season (and 50 losses) and that’s improvement. Definitely not as much as Clipper fans and the Clippers themselves would have wanted, but improvement nonetheless.

Now, let’s hope for a quickly agreed upon CBA.

Notes

DeAndre Jordan played well tonight. Not only did he go for 14 points on 5 for 5 shooting, but he defended Gasol very well. Gasol went 5 for 11 from the field and struggled with Jordan’s length even with DeAndre helping so frequently. Most players played against substitute level players, but not DeAndre. And he even grabbed 10 rebounds, stole 3 balls and blocked 2 shots. Not a bad night to end on.

The Clippers are so good at momentum dunks (and that fast break alley-oop by Bledsoe and Blake was incredible), but they also let the Grizzlies get some good looks. Sam Young and Darrell Arthur found themselves opportunities to dunk and took advantage of it. The Clippers have to be better at letting cutters get around the hoop.

Eric Bledsoe and the energy. That should be a band name. But seriously, after sitting out a game due to a still unknown (and I asked) suspension, Bledsoe came in and made a huge difference. Bledsoe scored 13 points on 6 for 9 shooting, served 6 assists, stole the ball three times and blocked two shots, but he did most of the damage in the first. He’s still a turnover waiting to happen, but the fact that Bledsoe responded well to the suspension has to be a good sign.

Another good game for Eric Gordon. He seriously has the most quiet big points of any player I’ve ever watched. He made some huge floaters down the stretch, but when I see that he scored 24 I’m left scratching my head. More important, he had 6 assists and handled the ball well with Mo Williams and Randy Foye struggling. It’ll be interesting to see if the Clippers use Gordon as more of a primary ball handler next year, as he’s much more effective with the ball in his hands.

Aminu played slightly better in his 24 minutes. He still had a couple dumb turnovers. Let’s face it, if Marc Gasol is getting his feet set on a guy like Aminu, Aminu is probably not doing it right. He’s so quick and agile that he should never have to worry about being called for a charge by running into a guy like Gasol. It’s not like Gasol sneaks up on anyone.

Blake had an amazing amount of dunks tonight. I posted some of the clips, but I couldn’t find the fast break double clutch that was so awesome. In that vein, Eric Bledsoe also had some ridiculous jams.

Leon Powe was tossed first, then Craig Smith later, and the game saw a handful of technical fouls over the course of the game. This is not unusual for the Clippers, as they have found a way to get under other teams’ skins. This can be used for a lot of good.

Foye and Williams played terribly, almost like they were on the last day of work before the vacation. Oh, wait, that’s exactly what it was.

**repost from previous thread since this is the last official game summary of the year**

YEAR END EVALUATIONS FROM – METAL MATTY

BLAKE GRIFFIN –
An epic year for Blake. Not a perfect year, but just to have a man of this talent healthy for an entire year was a blessing for the Clppers. Defensively, Blake has some serious work to do, though he showed some flashes of improvement late in the year. Blake does not need to be a great defender or a shot blocker. His offensive style dictates he needs to save fouls on the defensive end. The goal here is to get back better in transition, be able to stop his own man a little better when playing against talent and in the crunch of games, become a dangerous shot blocker. He already tends to unlock his shot blocking only when the money is on the line which what we need. In general, this man has “awareness” of situation which is good. Offensively, he has a lot of room to grow but is already a terror.

ERIC GORDON –
A fantastic year for Eric. The wrist injury deflated but did not negate his improvement and heroics during the one really solid Clipper run this season. Turnovers are the obvious bugaboo. His penchance for attempting to split double teams I love, but the turnover rate is way too high on this move. As well as he shot the ball at times, he is an even better shooter than he showed this year. My fear with Eric is, although built like a tank, he throws himself into a LOT of hard falls going to the basket. It may be wise for him to find a little better mid range game so everything does not have to be a three or a wild and crazy drive to the hoop.

CHRIS KAMAN –
After looking like a “machine” during pre-season, Kaman fell apart when the game sped up as the season opened. Then got injured. When he finally made it back he actually played very well. The so called “decision” the Clippers need to make between Kaman and Jordan is a tough one. If Kaman did not have a history of injury, this would be a non-conversation as his skill and presence is night an day compared to Jordan (at this point.) But Jordan being a one in a million athletic marvel, and a healthy one at that leads us to a water cooler style “quarterback controversy” discussion of what tastes better, an apple, or an orange. Not to mention option number three, which is to keep them both. Perhaps the smartest move considering the Clippers are not hurting for cap.

MO WILLIAMS –
Mo is a “good” player, not a “great” player. Offensively his shot is strong and he is gutsy. He doesn’t pass especially well but is “servicable” as a PG. Definsively, he is poor, making him a “borderline” starter but a nice “luxury” off the bench.

RANDY FOYE –
Not a particulary good defender or a high percentage shooter, nonetheless, Randy’s game has it’s charm. He’s a gutsy shooter who can “get hot” even against a good team or good defense. In a pinch, he can start at either the one or the two. A nice bench player. 7th, 8th man. Big enough to play in a three guard linup. Does very little to help your team when his offense is “off” but though he can’t be ignored when it comes to spacing, even when cold.

AL-FAROUQ AMINU –
After starting out the season very promising, the likable Aminu’s season turned into a slow motion train wrech that was hard to look away from. After getting a slew of wide open looks early in the season and knocking them down with ease. Farouq’s game fell apart when he got happy feet from behind the arc and instead of waiting for his shot, began to hurry and even shoot off balance threes. Then upon the urging of coaches and fans alike began to “get more aggressive”. This backfired drastically, as his aggressive drives to the basket simply will not work in the NBA in a half court set. Too poor a dribbler. Too lankey and slow developing to get by ANYONE at the pro level. It will be interesting to see if the Clippers coaches will be smart enough to completely eliminate some of the parts of Aminu’s game that lack polish and will never lead to anything but turnovers in the NBA, because if he just sticks with transition, OPEN jumpers and good defense and rebounding, we are looking at a solid, perhaps even really good player.

ERIC BLESOE –
Talent is not a problem here. Size is not a problem here. This guy is capable of dominating a game in many areas including shot blocking. Unfortunately, he is also capable of driving the entire team right off a cliff. Some of the turnovers Bledoe is capable of boggle the mind. That said, he is lightning quick, lightning fast, and has a fairly good looking jump shot. If the attitude is right, he could become a whale of a player, but it’s going to take a lot of improvement in the area of “feel for the game”. You can see very easily that his natural instinct is to play at 100 miles an hour but his handle and vision can only support 80.

RYAN GOMES –
A disappointing, uneventful, and unexciting season from Gomes. A smart player that simply doesn’t produce enough milk to justify the cost of feed. Defensively, he is average, but not good. He doesn’t rebound and he doesn’t really score. He just avoids doing stupid things, which on this team, this season, rightfully landed him in the starting linup more often than not.

DEANDRE JORDAN –
Started to make some real progress mid season, especially defensively, then read his own press clippings and decided to take the rest of the season off. One has to wonder if this guy “gets it”. No doubt, Blake is a good influence but could it not be said that DeAndre is a bad influence on Blake. It seems to me Blake has become much more carefree since hooking up with DeAndre. From a personal standpoint, maybe that’s good for Blake. He’s an INTENSE guy. But as far as basketball I would keep a sharp eye on this. We don’t need Blake to become Mr. Hollywood and enter the movie circuit as a Shaqesque actor in some Baron Davis produced B-Movie.

CRAIG SMITH –
Everyone knows what Craig Smith is. A tank that can actually blow buy guys. A natural scorer around the basket. Undersized when it comes to length. Even pump faked once this year on instinct with no defender in sight. While that seems funny, it goes to show how smart this guy is. He’s crafty. Defensively, he is not anything special and he is an average rebounder at best from either of the big man spots. A SOLID bench guy, third or fourth big who can actually play a little SF against the slower ones as his strength to agility ratio is quite amazing.

IKE DIOGU –
Signed out of the blue, this man came in and made an immediate impact with his energy and rebounding including BIG rebounds. This is one of those bigs who has probably not once, ever, been accused of wondering from the paint. He will occasionally take and even make a jump shot but rarely without hesitation as it is obvious he is itching for something closer to the hoop. The odd man out later in the season somewhat inexplicably. A nice comeback year for Ike. He deserves a role next year for someone, even if it is not the Clippers.

BRIAN COOK –
At times did some heavy damage with his deadly three pt shooting. The injury set him back and he never found a role late in the season. A slow, lumbering, but intiguing player due to his lack of any conscience from deep. Runs hot and cold.

JAM MOON –
Not a bad little throw in for the Clips. Jamario is at best a bench player, but you could do worse. And if nothing else, he is rumored to play good defense. Not to mention, he knows his limits.

WILLIE WARREN –
Lit it up in the D-League for a while. Never found a role with the big club. Hard to say what will happen with Willie, but most likely he will get a shot to compete for a spot next year.

VINNY DEL NEGRO –
Though the Clippers had one VERY nice stretch of games, there were WAY too many games where the team played from behind and those they played ahead in the first half almost invariably were followed by giving away large leads all at once and third quarter collapses. The win / loss record, I feel did not tell the whole story when it comes to the LOOSING mentality this ball club exibited the entire year outside of one really nice run. It would be nice to throw Vinny an “atta boy”, but he simply didn’t get this team playing their best ball very often. Once the roster was “fully healthy”, we still played the same, careless, loosing mentality ball. Just looked a little more talented doing it. I don’t think Vinny surrounded himself with enough quality assistants and his X and O strategies in general did not work and were too predictable. The only real solid strategy that worked this year was Eric Gordon single handedly taking over the game late. I’m not sure that points to coaching brilliance so much as Eric’s talent level. But at least he was smart enough to let Eric run with it when he was hot. Clearly, nothing else late game was ever gonna work. Especially with six guys and the other team’s coach guarding Blake.

RALPH LAWLER –
Lalwers Law again tended to hold up this year as did the man himself. A joy to listen to. By far the best announcer in the league.

MIKE SMITH –
We could do worse. Mike has a good attitude and is “into it”. That said, he is a mamby bamb who can be extremely annoying with some of his antics such as the endless fishing for ways to caress statistics in order to put a player in “good company”. As much as I want to kill him sometimes, he on the whole meshes with Ralph pretty good, and Ralph routinely cuts him down to size. In the end, I’m willing to “tolerate” Smith as long as he is with Ralph, but if Ralph were to retire, Smith clearly has to go. We can’t have a second Chick Hearn / Stu Lantz debacle where the side-kick is left to essentially run the show.

JoeLuis

On national TV, ofcourse blake had to shine! The only reason this game was worth watching. Also because of the uncertainty that this team brings. Many great and really bad things come out from it. It went from … How did he do that!, to Wow that was an awesome half! to WFT happened to our lead! lol

Metal Matty

WTF happened to our lead has been the case all season and the fact that Vinny laughed it off after the game goes to show how far he has to come to be a good coach.

Slax

Hey Breene, nice write up of the players albeit it was missing a quick spell check. I think the Clippers would have been a .500 team even with Mo at the helm all year and would have still missed the playoffs. To really take it to the next level they need some good shooters/role players and a good starting small forward that can shoot and rebound. Foye definitely surprised, and Gomes disappointed, but BG and EG are definitely some awesome building blocks. I want to see a motivated off season by management to get a nice player for the 3.

Metal Matty

The coaching staff really let down Farouq Aminu this year. They let hin devolve and discintigrate. Every time he made a bad play, you could see all over his face he looked like somebody shot his dog. So you know he wants to do well. But the staff did nothing to improve his game or get him into improved areas of the court or successful situations. I wasn’t at the practices, maybe they put in a ton of work with him. But if so, it went to waste. It seemed like things eventually got to the point where he was viturually unplayable outside of a spot minute or two. I would really like to see this guy get some good training and direction during the offseason. And I hope he’s a gym rat because he needs the reps.

Bongstradamus

The lockout will be bad for the young guys. Hopefully DTS still decides to pay the staff during the lockout so we can still get some development in.

DeMote DeAndre

I was encouraged by Bledsoe’s play last night. The question about him is probably along the line of: was a short-term blockhead who’s now seen the error of his ways or is he a long term head case, as many point guards seem to be (Marbury, Iverson, Davis)? A lot of people are short term block heads and then snap out of it (Lamar Odom), and I’m hoping that’s the case with Bledsoe.

last night was inexusable for us to lose that big lead and almost lose the game to a B and C grizzlies team. VDN is better served as an assistant coach because the clippers need to run more than just screen and rolls. when the screen and roll play comes on the strong side, the players standing on the weak side just stand there. the first half was better executed with the screen and roll and players making the cut to the strong side. even with the iso plays where blake gets the ball on the wing. the weak side players are always standing there.

DeMote DeAndre

Another reason this was a good season for the Clippers: Minnesota was terrible, even worse than expected. The T-wolves had the worst record in the West by seven games over Sacremento. They lost their last 15 games. They finished with the worst record in the entire NBA by two full games over Cleveland and five over Toronto.

They likely will be just about as bad next year. They almost certainly will be the worst team in the West next year and everybody in the East will probably improve a little, with the possible exception of Toronto.

So the chances of next year’s Minnesota pick being in the top three is better than it was at the beginning of the year when most people thought Minnesota was improving. That’s a big thing.

I have a serious question. If there is no season next year, how is the draft order determined for the 2012 draft? Does it go back to the draft order in the 2011 draft?

If the upcoming season is cancelled, does that mean the Clippers will have the top spot going into the 2012 lottery?

Archon

Metal Matty,

That was a GREAT summary of the clippers. Your probably a little harder on VDN then I am but everything else was spot-on

well done

lumpen

I like the evolution of the game except for the stupidity of relax when you have a big lead, yes was the last game of the season but you have to show character.
The season as whole was in 4 qts., first quarte get the coaching staff late in the preseason was bad in the was that nobody was sure if they going the get a job or not, great moves, get Bledsoe that was a dunk, have Blake mentally ready (maybe he did it himself) dunk but get into the new season with a bunch of new guys, 3 rookies and a coach killer (BD).
2 qt. the start of the season was horrible as we remember until the famous meeting conducting primarily by Blake and Erick, some said that it was BD but not was those to guys that were working like crazy but nobody else with them a hand during the first part of the season. Half time was the this meeting to clear all the points.
3 qt players start playing like a team but still coaching problems until we got to the trade day, yes MO is coming BD is out 3 points shot, but Erik is out, Kman injured oh oh 3 qt as usual is not that good. 4 qt everybody is healthy let see what we got but again is our 4 qt we always strugle in.
In generel we had a better season, excited, hopeful, and the future is now, can we get Granger or Iguadola, who knows maybe Superman would like to play next to Blake and Eric.
Preseason starts now rookies, get into the gym, work with your couches, put yourselfs into a hard work, now you know what is the NBA now play in the NBA.

Jonathan

i say the clips are better served running the flex motion offense (the offense jerry sloan ran in utah) to get people moving instead of standing. either that or some version of the triangle to make better use of blake’s passing ability. aminu needs to play in the d-league to bring up his confidence. same with bledsoe. they play well at times but a lot of the time they make stupid mistakes. especially aminu. i would say aminu has regressed too much and that is either on him or on the coaching staff.